Chris Matthews on Wednesday took his smearing of conservatives to a new level, comparing Ted Cruz to the Nazi-sympathizing, World War II-era Father Charles Coughlin. After playing a montage of the Republican senator, Matthews sneered, “I think [Cruz] fits in the tradition of Father Coughlin and McCarthy and, of course, maybe to a lesser extent, Pat Buchanan and, of course, [Bill] O’Reilly.” [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Lumping all these men together, the Hardball anchor generalized, “These guys are hard right-wing guys. They look a lot alike. They have what we call the black Irish look to them.” According to Urban Dictionary, black Irish is someone with “dark hair and olive skin.” The liberal Matthews is quite sensitive on issues of race, so how is such talk acceptable?

Later, he continued: “Is a demagogue a good career plan? I mean, it worked for Huey Long for a while. It worked for a lot of guys like Coughlin for a while and certainly McCarthy.”

After finishing that rant, Matthews quickly backtracked and noted that South Carolina Republican Tim Scott is black. He was further corrected moments later by one of his guests, weekend MSNBC host Steve Kornacki, who also noted that William “Mo” Cowan of Massachusetts is black.

My father was 'Black Irish' olive skinned with kinky hair even and his mother was from County Cork which, for the non Micks among you, is in the south of Ireland where the wreckage of the Armada washed up. So I expect I have some Spanish, Moorish, perhaps even Black African blood. To which my response to Mr. Matthews 'You lookin' at me punk?'

My dad was of college age in the 30s and was very much concerned that the US would end up either fascist or communist. He was a New Yorker and an FDR Democrat and had no use for Coughlin and admitted to me that although he despised assassination, honesty compelled him to admit that he heaved a sigh of relief when Huey Long was shot. It is surprising to see people like Matthews who is not that much younger than me make mistakes that would have caused great gouts of derisive laughter around our house when I was growing up.